


Of Carrots and Cats

by sparrowofsong



Series: What a Nightmare! Concept Fics/Oneshots [1]
Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Arachnophobia, Blood, Gen, Hallucinations, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Memory Loss, Psychological Trauma, Psychosis, Self-Harm, Starvation, Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, Whump, Whumptober 2020, no.16
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 07:08:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,302
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27139846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sparrowofsong/pseuds/sparrowofsong
Summary: "Tut, tut, tut, tut,come on out little guy! You're okay!" he whispered. The carrot took a few tentative steps toward him, and Janus was nearly overwhelmed by sheer delight. It waslisteningto him! Janus couldn't remember the last time something listened to him!After being forgotten and locked away in his empty room for longer than he can remember, Janus has begun to lose his grip on reality. He's also quite hungry....You could say he doesn't carrot-all what he gets to eat as long as it's food.(This works as a standalone fic as well as a part of the AU.)
Series: What a Nightmare! Concept Fics/Oneshots [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1981045
Comments: 3
Kudos: 30
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Of Carrots and Cats

Something orange flashed across Janus’s vision. Taken off guard, Janus furrowed his brow in confusion. 

Orange? Since when was anything _orange_ in his room? 

He turned his head in the direction the thing went, and his eyes widened at the sight before him. 

A carrot.

His chest swelled with elation – or maybe that was hunger. Either way, he couldn’t care less what Thomas, and him by extension, thought of carrots. It was _food_. And it was _right there_. 

As he reached toward it, it started to run off, much to his dismay. "Nnh, nh, no, no, no, stop, come back! Please!“ It halted and turned to him at the entrance of its hidey-hole in the wall. (What Janus wouldn’t give to be that carrot. The lucky bastard could have a hiding place but not him? Unfair.) 

He shook his head and focused on the sheer delight that it was _listening_ to him, then began whispering gently. "Please come back. You’re okay. Come on.” The carrot didn’t move. Wasn’t there a sound people made for animals to come to them? He forgot which animals exactly, but there was _something_ , he knew that much.

He absentmindedly clicked his tongue in thought, and realized that it sounded familiar in this context. He clicked his tongue a few more times. The carrot took a few more steps closer. Grinning from ear to ear, he stifled a gleeful giggle. “There you go, bud. That’s it. Just a lll… lihh…." 

He paused. What was the word again? It felt like it should be easy to remember. Why was he having so much trouble remembering things lately? He was losing track of relative time more and more often. He was forgetting words, simple and complicated ones alike. He was _always_ forgetting his train of thought (not that it was ever important, of course). A while ago, he– no, it was more recent than "a while,” wasn’t it? How recent? Was it today, yesterday, a few days ago? How long even _was_ a day these days? Huh. Day was a weird word. It was pronounced like there were two vowel sounds, even though it was treated like it had one. Deh-ee. Dee. _Deceit_. God, how he hated that word; just the thought of it made him shudder. If only he could forget–

Oh, right, forgetting things. He was thinking about that for some reason. When was he doing that? It must have been a few hours ago. Or a few minutes? Which one was longer, again? He hadn’t thought about it in a few years– weeks– months– decades? He couldn’t tell you. He didn’t exactly have a calendar available to him. But it didn’t really matter anyway, did it? After all, time was meaningless in the face of eternity.

As he lay his head down in exhaustion, he spotted something orange out of the corner of his eye.

Orange? Since when was anything _orange_ in his room?

He strained his neck to get a better look without exerting himself too much, and was elated by the sight before him.

A carrot!

_Food!!_

His eyes widened in excitement. Who _cared_ how gross carrots were? At this point, he’d take anything he could get.

He forced himself vaguely upright once more, preparing to drag himself toward it, and he could almost feel his heart split in two when it ran inside its hidey-hole in the wall. (What Janus wouldn’t give to be that carrot. The lucky bastard could have a hiding place but not him? Unfair.)

Knowing all too well he’d never be allowed to reach the wall, he decided to try and coax the carrot out to him instead. Maybe it was like a cat! They had the same letters, after all. Right? Probably. They _sounded_ similar at the very least. He realized he couldn’t remember the last time he saw the two written down. Or anything written down, really. When was the last time he read a book? When was–

He noticed a bit of orange peek out of a hole in the wall. Right, the cat! Wait, that was too small for a cat. Unless it was a kitten. Ooh, that sounded closer to the word he was using before, though he couldn’t quite put his finger on what it was. There must have been two syllables for sure. What was orange with two syllables and a “cuh” sound at the beginning?

Coral.

Construction.

Traffic cone.

Kayak.

Cantaloupe.

Cantaloupe sounded _delicious_ right about now. Anything did, if he was being honest (like he was supposed to be). Even carrots would be–

_Carrot!_

Relieved to see that it was still there, he clicked his tongue a few times to coax it out of its hidey-hole. (What Janus wouldn’t give to be that carrot. The lucky bastard could have a hiding place but not him? Unfair.) 

“ _Tut, tut, tut, tut_ , come on out little guy! You’re okay!” he whispered. The carrot took a few tentative steps toward him, and Janus was nearly overwhelmed by sheer delight. It was _listening_ to him! Janus couldn’t remember the last time something listened to him! “There you go, bud. That’s it. Just a little bit cl… c…. more.. here? Nearer!” He mentally congratulated himself for remembering the exact word so quickly. “Come on. You can do it. _Tut, tut, tut, tut, tut_ …”

As agonising a wait as it was, Janus made sure the carrot was a mere few inches away from him before he pounced. To his amazement, it only took _one try_ to snatch it up! Tears of joy began to well in his eyes as he laughed triumphantly.

He did something right!

He _succeeded!!_

Janus held it closely to his chest for a few moments, savoring this rare victory, before carefully opening his hands a teeny tiny bit to peer inside. His heart dropped when he saw that the carrot was gone. In its place was something black that was rather unpleasantly squirming around. He opened his hands more to get a better look, and noticed first that it was not, in fact, one thing. It was _many_ things. He noticed second exactly what things they were, and had only a moment to register the information before they began escaping his grasp. 

He screamed in horror as countless spiders crawled up his arms, down his neck and back, in his hair, through his wounds and into his veins, through his mouth and into his lungs and stomach, through his ears and into his brain. They were biting him, poisoning him, choking him, eating him alive from the inside out and the outside in. They were _everywhere_. 

The welled up tears of joy now fell as tears of anguish. He clawed at his skin to tear them out, but every spider he removed revealed two more in its place, and they seemed more than happy to infest the newly-created wounds as well. He yanked his hair to pull them out of his head, but only succeeded in transferring more from his hands. He hit his head against the floor to knock them back out of his ears, but they only latched more tightly onto his brain. He began hacking violently to clear them from his lungs, but every inhale between coughs drew more in. 

There was nothing he could do. He was helpless. As usual. 

Couldn’t he just have one success? He knew he didn’t deserve it, of course, but still, not even _one?_

It didn’t take long for him to lose the little energy he’d spent so long trying to stockpile. Trembling with fear and exhaustion, his breaths unsteady and faltering, he managed to curl into a ball, clutching his head with now golden, bloody hands as though he could somehow protect himself. 

What wishful thinking.

…Hopefully it didn’t count as a lie.


End file.
